Wellness Check for Mr Barnes
by potater
Summary: A scene where Bucky Barnes resides out west, in Interstellar-inspired America.


In the country there aren't any trees. All there is is to watch the sky, sweeping storms across in the summer months and the wind tussling the grass. I appreciate it. The storms that is. The violence of it, and the rest of the time, the quiet. Just gotta hope a big one doesn't come along sometime and knock down the place. If I want to keep going that is.

Mostly I read newspapers. Nobody really comes out here except the newspaper man who delivers them in large piles from the archives. I have enough food for myself from the land. Mostly I read.

Then one day someone comes knocking.

"Mister Barnes?" they ask at the door. Some kid, some girl. It's August and the season is begun to turn. Outside it's windy. I figure it's better to let her in so I slap down The New York Times Friday May 19th 1987 on top of the pile and unlatch the door.

"H-Hey Mister Barnes - Jeez you don't look a day over - thirty," she stumbles. She's about that old herself but might be younger. This places wears on people, I've noticed.

"I - I don't know if you remember me but I'm the Dodgson girl. Penny Harris now. My family used to live down the road by the intersection with 73?"

"Mhm?"

"Oh well I just wanted to check on you 'cause nobody'd stopped by in a while and we thought you might've...I dunno might need a hand around the place? But I see that you've got the farm going all right."

"I do."

"Oh well that's good."

The wind shoots across the sprawl on grassland, blasts dust through the 6 inches of doorway. I squint at it. "Do you want to come in Penny?" I look past her. She parked a red truck a short distance down and I am surprised I hadn't heard it. I look back to her, curious.

"Well that'd be good."

I step aside then shut the door and follow her back to the stack of papers.

"Gee Mister, you are Bucky Barnes, aren't you? Not his son or somethin'?"

"Yes ma'am. Don't trouble yourself over it." I move towards the chair by my stack, then realize it's the only piece of furniture for sitting on. I drag it a few feet aside over to Penny, then seat myself on the heap of papers. It's a nice orderly pile, nearly three feet tall, as they always come.

She sits and the chair squeaks loudly. There is an uncomfortable silence where she looks around and finds there isn't really much to look at.

"What brings you down here Penny?" She looks like so many other people here. Tanned with tan freckles and hair. Her eyes are nervous but sharp and blue. She wears one of the half-zipper up sweatshirts that tightly hugs her thickly curved body and ends in a high collar about her neck. It's pink. I expect she has children. Penny Harris I think.

"I was just visiting my parents. They mentioned you."

"What did they - "

"Wondered if you still lived up the way. Thought it might be good to reconnect with some older folks like them. They get lonely y'see."

She looks very uncomfortable and I feel sad at what I feel I am going to say. I can't see myself sitting on their porch enduring the same lurid curiosity and confusion at my appearance, can't see myself making smalltalk. I'm happy as I am. I tell myself that. But then I think - families, they probably cook better than I do.

"I can go on down some time." I pause. "What's their names again?"

"Paul and Linda."

"Dodgson." I say to prove I'm not completely senile. She smiles but it's sort of empty.

"You're alone here Mister Barnes?"

"Well there's animals too. Where's your husband, Penny?"

She looks perturbed, then recovers firmly, "Well he's in the war."

"The war?" I echo. I look down at my pile of newspapers. "1989," I say. "'aven't got to the two thousands yet." Then, "Well I'm glad he has you. That ain't an easy thing, and I would'a liked a girl waiting back home for me."

She scowls a little. "You fought?"

"Mhm." She doesn't get anything else from me. I don't want her to think I'm crazy, or dangerous, even if I am. "I'll go down some time, pay your folks a visit."

She takes the cue. "Thanks Mister Barnes. I'll be going now." She stands up, eyes flickering around the room, and the chair squeaks again. She doesn't seem afraid so much as bewildered, which is good. "Good to know you're still doing well."

"Yes ma'am. Thanks for the concern."

I walk her out and stay by the door after it's closed to listen for her car departing. After a minute it does, rumbling off into the distance.

The truth is it's been a long time. A long time. And sometimes I wonder if it's catching up with me. If today's the day that I let my guard down and slip up. If my memory is getting worse, of if there is simply too much to known.

I open the door again, and step out this time to stand guard. From the porch I can see the old foundations, irregular patches in the grass. Most of the other places have been eaten up by nature now, only the untilled and wild fields standing as testimony that this land used to have some life to it. Some of the fields still produce crop, and I wander through once in a while to collect what corn there is. It's taken decades, but these days the worst I fear is hunger, and with the land under my feet I at last feel master of my experience.


End file.
